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09 July 2014

Paris, France: July 6

The French Men

Our first real day in Paris started off with a nice confidence boost! First thing in the morning we hit the subway station headed towards central Paris. As we were transferring trains and going up on an escalator, a young man comes up to Alex and says, "Excusez-moi" and then starts mumbling out something in French. Alex replied, "Sorry, no French." She thought she was in his way and leans away and scoots closer to the side. He then leaned in closer and said, "English?" Alex, "Yes!" Then he said with a French accent, "You are very beautiful." :) (Side note: this made me really happy. Not only do we both agree that she is gorgeous, but I was also happy it was her and not me!! Haha! Last time I got an old man at Wimbledon hitting me on and wanting to fly and meet us somewhere on our trip. Haha... Not happening.)

Then him and his friend start talking to us with their basic English asking us where we are from and trying to get our numbers. (I thought I was off the hook until his friend Steve came into the picture.) We told them our phones didn't work because we don't have service here. Then they ask, "You have Facebook?" Darn, they got us. Who doesn't have a Facebook?! Us, "Uhh... Yeah..." So Alex's man pulls out his phone and has her type her name into FB. Luckily my guy didn't have his phone and just asked for my email. Then they asked the key question, "Do you have a man?" Us, "Yeah! We have boyfriends, sorry." They were slightly bummed, but it still didn't stop them from telling us both we are beautiful and trying to add us on Facebook.

As we said goodbye they first gave us a high five, then talked to us a little more and we gave them a hand shake, and then Alex's man started coming in towards me for a kiss! Ahh!!! I had no idea what was happening!! He was getting closer and closer and I was frozen thinking, "Why me?! You were picking up on Alex!" But then he gave me a kiss on each cheek. Still pretty uncomfortable, but I suppose some people do that in Paris? Hopefully? That guy then did the same to Alex and then his friend followed in his footsteps and kissed both of us on the cheeks. (Full contact, not just the noise and motion like normal). Although they were really nice guys, we felt pretty weird after that encounter. Sorry Andrew and Zach! Haha! We did our best to escape!

Notre Dame

The first stop we made was to Notre Dame! It is gorgeous inside and out! We got to see church going on inside and it looked like a Cathoic mass. It's amazing being in such ancient buildings! An interesting fact I learned was that when constructing the building the men would use a human-size hamster wheel contraption to use as a crane to lift the stone. Crazy! Thank goodness for modern technology!

It rained quite a bit while we were in Paris! It made things slightly more inconvenient, but way more hilarious as we ran around trying to avoid getting soaked.

St. Chappell

This is a chapel that has the Old Testament stories all the way up to Christ's cricifiction in the stain glass images!

This picture is one of the most important because it is of Jesus Christ with the thorns on his head representing his crucifiction. I'm amazed at how they could show these stories with glass images. They also only used 4 colors!

Eiffel Tower

We loved our visit to the Eiffel Tower! This was a moment where I had to pause and soak in the fact that I am in Paris at a place I've only dreamed about visiting. It was very surreal to be standing under the Eiffel Tower and convincing myself that this is real and that I am actually experiencing this! I feel so blessed!!

Funny experience: I asked an Asain man to take a picture of Alex and I in front of the Eiffel Tower. He said yes and took a pretty bad picture of us. Haha! Then in broken English he held out his camera and said, "You take picture?" I replied, "Of course!" I reached out for his camera assuming he wanted me to take a picture of him in front of the Eiffel Tower in return. Nope! He handed his Alex his itouch and motioned for me to take the picture with him. Alex and I were so confused! Once we figured out what he was wanting each of us to do my new friend and I posed for the picture that Alex took for us! Haha! If we knew this was going to happen I would've capitalized on the opportunity and got a picture on my camera too, but I didn't think of that in the moment. Biggest regret of the trip so far! Haha! Before we parted he showed me the picture and said, "Very nice! Thank you!" I said your welcome, said goodbye, and watched my new BFF walk away into the distance.

Escargot (snail):

Couldn't have the real Paris experience without trying some escargot! I thought it was pretty good!